


every word that he said

by dreamcatchme



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, F/M, M/M, There will be sex, be patient friends, i dont even know, they work at pizza hut together okay, waiter!grantaire
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-09-06
Updated: 2013-09-07
Packaged: 2017-12-25 18:26:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,543
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/956289
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dreamcatchme/pseuds/dreamcatchme
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Shall we get a takeaway?"<br/>"Yes, Grantaire. But not pizza. Anything but pizza."</p><p>Or: Between lectures and parties and protests, Grantaire and Enjolras work together at Pizza Hut. Sadly the restaurant has a strict no-drinking policy set down for its staff, so really Grantaire should have known he was royally screwed from the very start.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> In which Grantaire hates Pizza Hut with a passion and develops a crush.

**I**

 

It’s only his first day on the job, and Grantaire has already decided that he fucking hates working at Pizza Hut.

 

Call him melodramatic, call him an unbelievable pessimist, but he’s pretty sure he doesn’t look _completely_ like a pile of shit on the pavement and therefore doesn’t deserve to be treated like one as thoroughly as he has been since 11am this morning. It’s a Saturday, which doesn’t help at all as Leicester Square is crawling with tourists and school kids on top of the usual horde of office workers, and he has been rushed off his feet all day, literally in one instance when an insipid, greying gargoyle of a woman abruptly untucked her chair as Grantaire walked behind her and sent him flying down the aisle. She’d yelled at him of course, because _obviously_ it had been entirely Grantaire’s fault for not looking where he’d been going and so _needless to say_ she couldn’t be blamed for the gorgeous front-to-back rip across the knee of the new black skinny jeans he had bought especially from Topman – _Topman!_ \- to go with his uniform Pizza Hut polo shirt and apron. Every table in his section has caused him some sort of problem today, and in his idle moments back in the kitchen things aren’t much easier.

 

“Grantaire!” shrieks Helen, head pizza chef and two-hundred-and-forty pounds-worth of sheer, uncensored bitch. “Desserts for table sixteen! Come on, do you need to be told to do _everything_ twice?!”

 

“Doing it now!” he lies serenely, inhaling deeply and heading over to the dessert station by the kitchen door, appreciating the cool incoming breeze as he reads the order off of the little electric screen. _It isn’t even that fucking nice_ , he screams inwardly as he sets to work microwave heating the billionth and billion-and-first cookie dough dishes of the day. He’s a bit too aggressive with the chocolate sauce bottle pump, though, and before he knows it it’s dripping down his arm and a dark, gooey puddle forms on the worktop. He groans, then gasps and turns as he feels an arm slip around his waist and a head come to rest on his shoulder. The pixie-like brunette opens her mouth to speak, then raises her eyebrows and glares at the mess in front of Grantaire.

 

“What the fuck are you doing?” Eponine asks, amusement clear in her voice.

 

“Thank God it’s only you,” Grantaire sighs, casting around for inspiration. He spots a damp J-cloth on the other side of the kitchen and Eponine follows his gaze – she dances away from him, light on her feet, then returns a second later, cloth in hand.

 

“I’ll sort this out,” she assures him with a smile. “You get on with that. Christ knows you don’t need Helen on your case for anything else tonight.”

 

Grantaire grins at his flatmate, silently thanking her for both the favour and for effectively getting him the job in the first place, and affectionately tucks a strand of hair that’s come loose from her ponytail back behind her ear. “You’re an angel, Ep.” He finishes plating up the two desserts with a flourish and reaches up to grab some cutlery.

 

“Twat,” he hears her mutter in what he likes to imagine is a loving way before he nudges open the swinging kitchen door with the toe of his Converse and carries the plates into the busy restaurant.

 

Once he’s unloaded the desserts onto the table of a pair of middle-aged women who regard him with as much distaste as one would a particularly bad smell, he hears the sharp ring of the bell on the front-of-house podium. Someone must be waiting for a table, then. Grantaire doesn’t turn around, just pulls the dry-cloth out of his belt loop and wipes down two recently vacated tables at the edge of his section instead – he hasn’t been taught how to deal with the podium and the bookings record yet, what with it being his first day, so he knows he shouldn’t feel obliged to head over there. But a minute passes, then two minutes, and all of the other waiters seem to be either totally absent or caught up in conversations with customers, and the podium continues to go unoccupied. Grantaire bites his lip. _Fuck it_ , he thinks, then turns on his heel and strolls to the podium, pleasant smile cemented back on his face.

 

Four guys stand in front of him, facial expressions ranging from irate to somewhat amused. The one closest to Grantaire is broad-shouldered, blonde and wears black-edged glasses, the thick-rimmed kind Grantaire had only ever seen before on the hipster bookworm kids that congregate in the Starbucks on the other side of Leicester Square. He pulls the look off, though, and seems to be utterly engrossed in conversation with two of his friends. One’s lanky with a mop of curly hair the colour of dark chocolate and a smirk on his dimpled face; the other is fairer, brown hair bleached somewhat by the late-summer London sun and face dotted with freckles. They seem a respectable enough bunch, perhaps even a little too wholesome-looking to be hanging out in Pizza Hut, and Grantaire’s smile only falters when his gaze falls upon their companion, standing just behind the trio with his BlackBerry to his ear and his glinting ochre eyes fixed on the window. He’s blonde, statuesque and undeniably, _irrefutably_ gorgeous in that preppy, pretty, carefully casual kind of way that Grantaire knows he shouldn’t find attractive but absolutely one-hundred-percent _does_ – his face is somehow all angles and curves at the same time, soft yet striking, and Grantaire specifically remembers thinking that this was a face that should be captured in marble by an artist who could do such a level of flawlessness true justice. And _that hair_ – it’s golden like the sun and curly and glossy and _fuck_ , the perfect length to tangle your fingers around and tug on. He’s wearing pale acid wash jeans, the overly-expensive kind from Abercrombie & Fitch that are so tight and give such a perfect view of his arse that Grantaire decides should be illegal, with a red and white polo neck sweater – his red Converse match Grantaire’s perfectly, and he carries a blazer over his arm. As Grantaire watches, swallowing hard, he ends his phone call and, intentionally or not, Grantaire isn’t sure, looks up at him from under his long, dark eyelashes, rendering Grantaire temporarily incapable of doing anything but staring at him. He suddenly remembers the Greek mythology unit of his art A-level, remembers spending hours in his bedroom sketching Aphrodite, Zeus, Leto and the gleaming, arresting example of blonde-haired perfection that was the god Apollo, and now Grantaire knows who this beautiful, extraordinary boy reminds him of.

 

“Um.” Grantaire shakes his head and snaps his gaze back to Blondie with Glasses. “Good evening, sir. Table for how many people?”

 

Glasses turns around and looks at Apollo with wide eyes. “Just four please,” says Apollo, and _shit_ , Grantaire almost forgets how to breathe because his voice is like sex and sunshine and dark chocolate all rolled into one. “The others are tied up with coursework,” he murmurs to Glasses in response to his surprised expression, and he nods. At that moment Apollo moves his gaze to Grantaire, and his eyes soften, hints of a smile playing around his lips. Confused, Grantaire tries to smile back, but suddenly, ridiculously, his heart is hammering in his chest. He turns and starts leading them toward a table, refusing to acknowledge the disappointment welling inside him that his section is irksomely full and instead having to head toward one of the five empty tables in Eponine’s section. One set of the footsteps behind him speeds up audibly, then Apollo is at his elbow, still ever so slightly behind Grantaire but close enough to talk to him without necessarily being overheard. “And you are?” Apollo asks, voiced laced with curiosity, and Grantaire is taken aback. Is it normal for customers to ask the names of their waiters in restaurants?

 

He swallows. “Grantaire,” he says, eyebrows pulling together. “Who wants to know?”

 

He’s obviously spoken with more acid than he intended though, and Apollo recoils slightly, cocking his head. “I was just wondering,” he says, taking the seat at their table nearest to where Grantaire is standing. “I’ve never seen you before. I know Helen’s been hiring. Are you new?”

 

“Wait... you work here?” Grantaire asks, and his stomach turns a somersault when Apollo nods, smile back in place.

 

“Yeah, part-time. I’m at uni here.”

 

“Me too!” says Grantaire, sounding stupidly like an overexcited teenage girl. “Today’s my first day at work though. I didn’t realise how much the costly social life of a uni student would set me back financially until recently, so...”

 

“Yep, it’s a killer,” mysterious Apollo agrees, somewhat resignedly, and Grantaire looks down to see that he’s subconsciously placed his hand on the back of Apollo’s chair. “I’m Enjolras, by the way.”

 

“Grantaire,” Grantaire says, and for a second they just smile at each other and Grantaire can feel his pulse in his throat.

 

“I know,” Enjolras says, nodding.

 

“I already said that,” Grantaire confirms, also nodding, feeling colour rise in his cheeks as Enjolras politely hides his amusement with a pleasant smile. “Menus. Yes. Right,” he mutters, and _oh Jesus Christ why is he so completely socially inept in the presence of sexy blonde co-workers and what did he do to deserve this shitty luck_. Grantaire sets the menus he picked up from the podium down on the table and folds his hands behinds his back, toying absently with the strings of his apron. Enjolras’ friends murmur ‘thank you’s, and Grantaire nods politely before he makes his escape toward the kitchen, nearly tripping over Enjolras’ chair leg and falling flat on his face as he goes. He can’t resist one more glance their way, though, and his stomach fills with butterflies when he sees Enjolras pointedly look away at the precise moment when Grantaire meets his gaze.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yep i have seriously written a pizza hut alternate universe and i sincerely apologize for what you've just read


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Eponine has already developed a crush.

**II**

 

Grantaire feels like his legs might give way from beneath him when he re-enters the kitchen, and to set his ridiculous mind at rest, just as he could have predicted he would, before getting back to work, heads to the break room, also known as the Tiny Closet with the Lockers and the Coffee Machine, and checks the rota for the upcoming week that hangs on the notice board. Sure enough, there is Enjolras’ name, handwritten in an elegant, sloping script on the little table – he’s down for four shifts this week, two lunchtimes and two evenings, the latter of which are both with Grantaire. He looks at the time – he is in urgent need of a cigarette or a drink or _something_ , but he’s had his final break of the day already and his shift still doesn’t end for another two hours. So jadedly he drags his feet back into the kitchen and, after a quick glance through the window to check that all of his occupied tables are being kept well-fed and happy, sets to work piling washing up into the dishwasher. He jumps out of his skin when Eponine pops up and starts helping him.

 

“Don’t you have orders to take?” he asks acerbically, flicking her with the tea towel in his hand and earning a cry from Eponine.

 

“Don’t you get all superior on me, new guy,” she retorts, digging him in the ribs with her elbow. She pauses. “Wait, do I have a table?”

 

“Yeah, they’ve only just sat down.” He grips her shoulders and stares as intensely as he can manage without laughing into her face. “Four of them, Ep, and oh my fucking God, I think I finally know what an actual real life angel looks like, complete with blonde halo and perfectly formed arse.”

 

“Seriously?” Grantaire nods furiously, and Eponine throws down the plate she’s supposed to be drying, tugs her notepad out of her apron and, after winking in his direction, heads out into the restaurant.

 

After five minutes of silently cursing his flatmate for her sheer dumb luck that landed Apollo – _Enjolras_ –and his friends in her section rather than his own, Grantaire raises his eyebrows and watches as Eponine reappears through the kitchen door, now with her hair loose and bouncing around her shoulders, her top two buttons undone allowing maximum cleavage exposure and a swagger in her walk that hadn’t been there before. She plucks the front page from her order notepad and hangs it from the little washing line next to Helen’s pizza oven. “Order in,” she practically sings before returning to Grantaire’s side, a smirk on her face.

 

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Grantaire demands of her, elbowing her side with his free arm as he lifts the hood of the dishwasher and pulls out the last load. When she doesn’t respond immediately he goes to look up at her, but his eyes are instantly drawn to her ridiculous cleavage, on display for the world to see. His jaw drops. “Eponine, have some self respect.”

 

“Creep,” she says, but there’s nothing serious in her voice. “Well, you _would_ be a creep if you weren’t as gay as the day is long.”

 

They glare at each other for a moment. “Rude,” says Grantaire, voice icy, then Eponine laughs and starts helping to unload and stack freshly-cleaned plates.

 

“Your boyfriend is Enjolras and you’ll be pleased to know that he’s a pizza skivvy like us,” Eponine tells him with the air of one commenting on the weather. “Only not like us. He’s better than us. If anyone in this fucking place cared enough, Enjolras would be employee of the decade, no questions asked. Helen adores him. I think she’s secretly his mom or something.”

 

“I already know he works here; I checked the rota out the back. He said he goes to the uni, too?” Grantaire isn’t really sure why he cares so much about Enjolras and what he does with his time, can’t put his finger on what he finds so fascinating about him. But Eponine seems well-informed on the subject and as always is happy to appease Grantaire, so he presses her for more.

 

“Yup. Politics and international relations. I think he wants to be a peace negotiator or something like that. He runs the poli-sci society with Courfeyrac and Combeferre, you know, the other two guys he’s sat with out there.” She jabs her thumb in the direction of the restaurant.

 

“Hmm,” Grantaire mumbles, chewing the inside of his cheek. Then he notices something. “Wait a second.”

 

“What?” Eponine answers a little too quickly not to arouse suspicion in Grantaire.

 

“Enjolras was sat with _three_ guys, Ep.” He leans his head forward, trying not to smile, but Eponine does everything in her power to avoid eye contact.

 

“Oh, yeah. The other guy was Marius.” She swallows hard and shrugs. “He’s cool, I guess.”

 

“Is he at university?” Grantaire presses, and no fucking way on this planet is he expecting what comes next from cool, calm and collected Eponine with her cold shoulders and her fuck-the-world-and-everyone-in-it attitude.

 

“Mmyeah, he’s studying English literature but he says it isn’t what he signed up for because he really hates the classics, the only one he can stand is _Oliver Twist_ because at least Dickens is _funny_ and seriously socially _aware_ where Bronte and Austen are just dreary and pretentious. He doesn’t mind the poetry though. He thinks Larkin and Ginsberg were geniuses in their own right, much more so than that ostentatious bint Emily Dickinson, and apparently if Robert Frost was still alive and located in the Greater London area they probably would have been great friends. He’s dreading his coursework, says that six thousand words is just too awkward a length for a poetry-prose comparative piece...” Then she comes up for air, and Grantaire’s eyebrows just about hit the ceiling.

 

“Right. Sounds good.” Grantaire nods once, a grin seriously threatening the corners of his mouth. “So, when’s the wedding?”

 

Eponine swiftly backhands him with such force that Grantaire has to bite his lip to stop himself from crying out like a girl. “At least he knows my name,” she says venomously, but it seems to be more for her own benefit than Grantaire’s and Grantaire chuckles to himself as he leaves the kitchen to clear two now empty tables. The restaurant closes in a little over than an hour and a half and the optimist buried deep in Grantaire tells him that the remaining three occupied tables in his section already seem to be finishing up – if he’s cleared up and ready before time, he’ll be able to leave earlier, and God knows all Grantaire wants right now is to curl up on the sofa in his flat with his best friend, a bottle of vodka and season eight of _Supernatural_. He has an oil piece and an essay on the Pre-Raphaelites due on Monday, but he feels like he’s worked hard enough for one day and will absolutely, _definitely_ get both completed tomorrow. Probably. As he stacks the huge round pizza trays and returns in the direction of the kitchen, he steals a glance toward Eponine’s section and spots that tangle of golden curls once more; Enjolras and his friends – Courfeyrac, Combeferre and the future Mr. Eponine Thernadier, Marius – close the school books and the copy of _The Guardian_ that litter the table and smile politely as Eponine delivers their food, and Grantaire can’t help but watch as she trains her gaze on Marius who, like Combeferre and Courfeyrac, stares transfixed at her. It’s obvious that Eponine is good at her job – she’s easy and breezy with customers, making light conversation in every moment of silence, and Enjolras seems to be the only member of their group immune to her charm, from this distance at least. When she spins around and heads back to the kitchen, Grantaire sees Marius’ eyes follow her the whole way there.

 

An hour later, Grantaire’s section is completely clear and the only table Eponine is waiting on is that of Enjolras and friends. The kitchen is blissfully almost empty now – head chef Helen has finally gone home, as there’s no one left to order main courses, and only a couple of waitresses whose names Grantaire hadn’t bothered to learn still loiter in the room, leaning against the work surfaces and nibbling on burnt pizza crusts as they wait to clear their final tables of the night. The pair of them are standing inside the kitchen door, staring through the little porthole window and sighing in general direction of their current favourite customers.

 

“Seriously though, Eponine, that _hair_ ,” murmurs Grantaire, pulling a hand through his own dark curls.

 

“Some people don’t like freckles, do they?” asks Eponine absently, as though she hasn’t heard Grantaire speak. “I don’t get why not. Freckles are lovely. Marius is lovely.”

 

“Mmm.”

 

Eponine heads to their table to check how they're doing, after some encouragement from Grantaire and taking several deep breaths, and they seem to ask for their bill. Grantaire watches as Eponine is only too happy to oblige, and they head to the nearest till podium and settle the cost of their meal. It’s only then that Grantaire realises that they’re about to leave and _fuck_ , he doesn’t know what makes him do it but the next thing he knows he’s out in the restaurant with Eponine, standing beside her at the podium and pretending to funnel a gibberish message to her from the kitchen about desserts or correct change or _something_ , he can’t really remember. In reality, all he wants is to be near Enjolras for just a second longer before he leaves, so when they’ve paid he smiles and wishes them a pleasant evening. They all nod and shrug into their jackets, apart from Enjolras, who hangs back for a second as his friends make their way into the foyer. He notices Marius waves to Eponine, who begins fanning herself with her hand the second he is out the door.

 

“When are you in next?” Enjolras asks, whether out of politeness or genuine curiosity, Grantaire isn’t sure.

 

“Monday evening, I think,” Grantaire tells him smoothly, feigning blasé uncertainty because _really_ he knows that he’s in from five till ten on Monday and so is Enjolras and that it’s utterly ridiculous to be excited about a shift for that reason.

 

“Hey, me too.” Enjolras smiles again, and it’s that genuine, sincere smile Grantaire saw earlier when he first seated them at their table. Grantaire nods, smiling back, and Enjolras pushes his blonde curls back from his face with his hand. “I’ll see you Monday, then, Grantaire.”

 

“Yes, I suppose you will,” Grantaire agrees. “See you.” And then Enjolras is gone.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Enjolras has a phobia, Combeferre is his hero and Grantaire is hungover (as always).

**III**

 

Enjolras, Courfeyrac and Combeferre pile out of Marius’ battered Ford KA, a car affectionately referred to be Courfeyrac as the Ugliest Car in the Known Universe (also _privately_ , as it’s the only car that they have what is basically unlimited access to and Enjolras would really prefer to keep it that way), and head up the path to the four-bedroom student house they rent in the centre of one of the more student-y areas of London, a three and a half minute drive away from Leicester Square – its tiny and cramped to say the least but it’s loveable and it’s _home_ , as it has been since they all started university over a year ago now. There’s a pretty little trellis covered in passion flowers and nasturtiums around the front of the house that Jehan insists is his baby and that he cares for, but in the moonlight it’s abundantly clear to Enjolras that the flowers have seen much better days and that, to his horror, the only thing in the vicinity that can really be classed as ‘life’ is the fucking _hideous_ spider currently relaxing in a web that’s hanging from the front door handle. Enjolras knows that if he comes within eight feet of it he’ll see the smug expression on its horrible little face that will undoubtedly scream _you have to pay rent and I don’t_ , but no way on this planet is he even going near the door until the abominable creature is gone, thank you very much.

 

“Courf, I need you,” he groans, stepping off the path and letting his charming, floppy-haired housemate overtake him.

 

“Who doesn’t?” asks Courfeyrac completely seriously, looping his arm around Enjolras’ waist and hauling him back on to the path. Then he notices the spider on the door handle and screams a scream that sounds so like that of a girl that it’s actually hilarious and Enjolras and Combeferre both laugh. “Nope. No thank you. Not my division. Combeferre, step up, be a man...”

 

“Jesus Christ,” says Combeferre, shoving them both out of the way and fearlessly grabbing at the spider. Enjolras has known the man before him all his life, been his friend for the vast majority of it, and he’s always been able to count on him in the throes of a Spider Crisis. And this one isn’t even that bad – he’s thanking every god out there that fucking _Jehan_ wasn’t out here to witness this. Last time an eight-legged freak decided to set up camp in their kitchen, which Courfeyrac had found and subsequently _lost_ , the poet had locked himself upstairs in his bedroom muttering about the fact that he didn’t really need food that urgently anyway and would easily be able to survive for the foreseeable future off the supply of fortune cookies and other takeaway leftovers that his room had to offer. A guilty Courfeyrac had eventually captured another one from the garden on a piece of paper and under a glass and shown this to Jehan, who, after announcing that he no longer felt like a prisoner in his own home, had emerged from his bedroom and insisted they celebrate. None of them have the heart to tell him Javert the Spider (affectionately named after Courf’s pure evil English literature professor at uni) has, to this day, not been apprehended; Jehan’s already sensitive heart can’t handle it, they’re certain.

 

When the Second Coming of Javert the Spider has been safely lobbed over the fence, the boys head into the house and Enjolras goes straight upstairs, suddenly furious with himself for leaving the remainder of his essay on the threat of cyberterrorism to critical infrastructure till the last minute because _really_ , to Enjolras, not having coursework finished a mere forty-eight hours before the deadline is just reckless behaviour. He pulls on his Jack Wills sweats, settles himself in front of his laptop and gets working, giving thoughts of a curly-haired waiter that smells like aftershave and chocolate sauce and cigarettes no choice but to be pushed to the back of his mind.

 

/

 

His face is boiling hot, and he feels a hand on his shoulder, shaking him gently.

 

“Come on, sleeping beauty,” says Courfeyrac, putting a cup of tea down on his desk. “Go to bed.”

 

Enjolras’ head spins and his eyes are bleary as he sits up, and he feels the imprints left by his laptop keys pressed into his cheek. He means to ask Courf what time it is, but it comes out as “whnnnfum” instead and he decides that he doesn’t really care. Courfeyrac puts the tea down on his bedside table as Enjolras climbs into bed, his aching muscles crying out in bliss as they come into contact with the piles of pillows and blankets, and before Enjolras knows what’s happened he’s disappeared out of the room, but Enjolras is convinced he can hear him humming One Direction on his way down the corridor. He takes a sip of his tea, settling down and relaxing as milky warmth floods through his veins, and reaches out for his phone on the far side of his bed. The little red numbers inform him that it’s just gone four a.m., and he groans out loud at the thought of working from ten tomorrow morning. Well, this morning, to put it accurately. The moon is full and high in the sky, sending a thick beam of white light streaming in through the gap in Enjolras’ paisley curtains, and he wonders idly if Grantaire, the bright, starry-eyed waiter is awake right now too. Maybe he’s staring up at the same moon as Enjolras.

 

He sighs and, after taking two more gulps from his tea and deciding to call it a night, he flicks off the lamp on his bedside table, letting his heavy eyelids droop to a close and allowing unconsciousness to pull him under properly this time.

 

/

 

When Grantaire eventually wakes up on Sunday morning, he’s wrapped up and rolled in his duvet like a gigantic human sausage, with a hangover the size of the moon that had kept him awake half the night with its brightness and no ability nor inclination to move whatsoever. After last night’s festivities at work, he and Eponine had headed back to their flat above the Thai takeaway in Leicester Square with a litre of Russian Standard from the off-license bought entirely with their combined tips and a fresh set of sorrows regarding gorgeous co-workers and classmates to drown. Urgently. So they’d set to work, and _shit_ , Grantaire is having one of those mornings where he swears to God and Jesus and fucking Satan if he’s listening that he will absolutely, one hundred percent never touch a drop of alcohol again. He knows he’s got an essay to finish and a painting to start _and_ finish before the day is out, and he has to get it done because at the moment he’s only just on track to get a two-one at the end of this year and if he leaves university with anything less than a second-class degree he will personally consider it to have been a waste of his time and money. Contrary to popular belief, Grantaire isn’t _completely_ masochistic and actually does have aspirations of his own, however warped or bizarre they might seem in comparison to the next person’s. He’d love to work for a gallery when he finishes uni, a proper one in a city somewhere – maybe here in London, or ideally somewhere glittering and prim and prestigious like Paris or Berlin. He’s got the brains and the determination and what he thinks is the talent, it’s just gaining the staunch, unwavering _focus_ that Grantaire tends to struggle with. And now that he’s got a certain mysterious blonde on his mind, things aren’t going to get much easier.

 

He can smell the deliciously artery-clogging aroma of sizzling bacon, so he manages to drag himself out of bed, pull on his jeans over his boxers and pad barefoot to the kitchen where he finds Eponine standing at the cooker, frying pan in hand, wearing nothing but her underwear and one of Grantaire’s old t-shirts. This one is dark grey and reads ‘a weekend isn’t wasted when you’re getting wasted’ from the front, as Grantaire sees when his tiny pixie of a flatmate turns around and grins at him.

 

“Morning, beautiful,” she greets him, eyeing his explosive mess of curls as one might a traffic accident at the side of the road – with polite shock, if it could be called that.

 

He sits down at the Formica kitchen table and leans his head down on it. “Eponine, _please_ , give me bacon or give me _death_...”

 

“Hang on, drama queen, it’s nearly ready.”

 

“Thank God,” he groans. He pulls a cigarette out of the box of Marlboro reds on the table top and lights it absently, pulling in a lungful of smoke and watching it swirl back into the kitchen. Not many student landlords would let their tenants smoke in their flats, but Grantaire and Eponine’s landlord, also known as Mr. Sudarat, the owner of the takeaway downstairs, disappeared several months back and hasn’t been seen since – their electricity and utilities have remained in working order, though, and the Thai is still open every night to its usual clientele. Grantaire and Eponine are fairly good tenants, consistently paying their rent on time and never making too much noise, but in all honesty no one of any importance is around to care if they weren’t. They’re lucky in that sense. “Eponine, I’m never drinking again.”

 

She snorts a laugh. “Pfft. Okay. Yeah. Good luck with that.”

 

“I’m serious!”

 

Eponine dumps a plateful of bacon and scrambled eggs and toast down onto the table and _oh my god_ Grantaire thinks that if it’s possible to have a food-related orgasm then he must be rapidly approaching one. “Of course you are. Hey, Marius is having a party at his house Friday night. He invited me.” She pauses to spoon scrambled eggs onto her plate, a little private smile on her face. “Be my date?”

 

“Marius? Where does he even live?” asks Grantaire, spearing a rasher of bacon as elegantly as he can manage and shovelling it into his mouth.

 

“Up on the student estate where everyone else from uni lives apart from you and me, the original Pizza Hut hipsters. No idea who he lives with. Never thought to inquire...”

 

“Too busy thinking with your dick, Ep.”

 

“Yes, Grantaire, that must have been the problem.”

 

After breakfast, Grantaire washes up the dirty plates then resigns himself to a day of hard work, setting himself up on their tiny square-metre of a balcony that overlooks Leicester Square with his easel and oil paints and Pre-Raphaelites textbook. The first painting he’s struck by is that of the Lady of Shalott, drifting across a lake in an old wooden longboat, regal features set in determination, fiery hair flowing down her back. He sets to work sketching an outline in HB pencil, but it just doesn’t look right by Grantaire’s hand – he can’t copy the original and, needing to give the piece life, needing to make it his own, he flips the pencil around and erases the tips of the Lady of Shalott’s hair, effectively cutting it to just above shoulder-length and flaying it out around her face. With the addition of the oil the hair becomes white rather than red, then yellow, then a shimmering golden blonde that seems to really glisten in the early afternoon muted London sunlight. Her face becomes more masculine, sharper, more angular, more striking until Grantaire decides to start referring to _her_ as a _he_ instead, then, later on in the day, several hours and a whole box of Marlboro cigarettes later, he decides that white is far too boring a colour for the subject of a painting to wear – instead he leaves the background white, stark now against the red of the _Lord_ of Shalott’s high-collared coat. _Jacket. Blazer. Whatever it is._

 

He sits back and admires his work. It isn’t like anything he’s painted before, and he frowns up at the easel, uncertain.

 

Then Eponine comes up behind him and leans on his shoulder. “Oh Christ, you’re _painting_ him now,” she drawls, tracing the painted Enjolras’ outline with the lightest brush of her fingertips. “You are so fucked.”

 

And Grantaire knows she’s right.


End file.
